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Only 12% Think U.S. Should Step Up Involvement in Syria

The Obama administration has increased its criticism of Syria’s violent response to anti-government protests, and both President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are now calling for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down. But most U.S. voters continue to think America should mind its own business when it comes to Syria.

Just 12% of Likely U.S. Voters believe the United States should get more directly involved in the Syrian crisis, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. Sixty-six percent (66%) think the United States should leave the Syrian situation alone. Twenty-two percent (22%) are not sure which course is better. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

This marks little change in voter sentiment from early May when Syria’s internal political crisis began gaining more news coverage and is consistent with views expressed earlier this year about U.S. involvement in the domestic turmoil in Egypt and other Arab countries.

Largely unchanged, too, is the view by just 26% of voters that the Obama administration is doing a good or excellent job in response to the political situation in Syria. Twenty-eight percent (28%) now view the administration’s handling of the political crisis in Syria as poor, up five points from early May.

The national survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on August 19-20, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

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